A Change of Guard

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Thursday, 3 May 2012

Jimenez: Linking Cambodia to the Filipinos

By Toots Jimenez Jr.
Thursday, May 3, 2012

IT WAS an experience that we landed on the soils of Siem Reap, Cambodia when Cebu Pacific Air inaugurated its maiden flight to link the Philippines to the Kingdom of Cambodia. Leaving the NAIA Terminal 3 with a fully booked Airbus A-320 aircraft, the inaugural flight also carried more than eighty high school teachers from a Catholic school in Batangas as part of their educational trip which teachers said, happens every two years.
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Siem Reap is a two-and-a-half-hour trip from Manila and we were billeted at the 5-star Sofitel Luxury Hotel in Angkor, Cambodia. We noticed that the young place of Siem Reap had too many hotels; this could be due to the foresight of hotel operators that Siem Reap is indeed a destination worth investing their million dollars.
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Cambodia Airports is the management group and owners of the airports in the Kingdom of Cambodia, as we were told by our very kind host. Cambodia Airports Commercial Manager Sinos Bartholomew’s airport group treated us to dining and entertainment and sightseeing in Cambodia.

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The focus of foreign tourists to the quiet Siem Reap is the visit to its various temples, more so the Angkor Wat (wat means temple). Angkor Wat was our second day destination and we saw thousands of tourists just in one late afternoon visit.
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The temple is a stone structure from decades back and it was indeed an experience to witness what Angkor Wat is all about. Even the idea of watching the sunset and taking an early wake-up call to watch the sun rise are two of the amazing attractions when you visit Siem Reap.
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There is a real travel opportunity for tourists in Siem Reap and it seems to have been found by Cebu Pacific Air, thus the idea of making true linking the Philippines and Cambodia. We talked to several passengers and they said they were happy that Cebu Pacific Air flew to Siem Reap because years back those who went to Cambodia had to fly to Vietnam and take a six-hour land ride to Cambodia just to get there.
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Comparing the Philippines, there are also a lot of stony destinations in this country. I believe the packaging and promotional effort of the stakeholders in travel and tourism is still a weak factor in the soils of the country. Let’s knock on the doors of the tourism people, then.
Published in the Sun.Star Bacolod newspaper on May 03, 2012.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Temple stones are not just decades but centuries old.